Page 60 from: Recycling International November/December issue 2024
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DEMONSTRATING SUCCESS
‘It’s exciting to walk around the facili-
ty and see how our team’s hard work
has paid off,’ says Julia Stadler, who
heads digital solutions at the family
company. ‘This is my first time here in
Turin. We have so many plants world-
wide, it’s impossible to see them all
immediately. It’s good to visit and see
a plant with your own eyes, though.
This press tour is a great reason to
have the whole team here.’
She echoes her father’s sentiments
that close collaboration and consult-
ing is the key to success. ‘Gaining
insights into your plant is becoming
ever more important. Data is every-
thing. My digital solutions depart-
ment is eager to make operating a
plant easier by offering Stadler
Connect.’
The AI-driven system can detect
blockages while analysing bales and
predicting maintenance. ‘Did you
know that around 40% of downtime
at plants is caused by blockages?’
Ferrous material is removed from the
3D stream before the fractions go
through an optical sorter to deliver
clear PET, blue PET, coloured PET,
opaque PET and trays. In parallel,
HDPE, PS and PP fractions are sorted
on a second line. The output of the
two 3D lines comes together for the
extraction of clean aluminium parti-
cles. Any residual materials from the
2D and 3D lines go through a second
sorting process. This way, Iren can
recover any remaining valuable mate-
rials.
ADVANCED FEATURES
The sorting cabin is equipped with an
efficient air conditioning system that
maintains a comfortable working envi-
ronment all year round. The air is
refreshed ten times per hour.
Stadler also installed an advanced
load cell system to monitor the quan-
tity of incoming material and the
quantities of the different materials
stored in the bunkers ready for bal-
ing. This enables the operator in
charge of the baling presses to keep
track of exactly how much material is
contained in each bunker and to cal-
culate the number of bales for each
product. Iren is considering expand-
ing the site with an automated bale
de-wiring unit, called WireX, which
Stadler launched earlier this year.
Gunari says that the start-up phase
was very quick. ‘There was one month
of material testing and we were ready
to go. It helps that we have lots of
legs on the floor, so to speak, with all
these conveyors. Material is constant-
ly moving.’
He likens the plant set-up to the pop-
ular balancing blocks game, Jenga.
‘Our Circular Plastics hub is built to
be flexible. Is one unit down? No
problem, we can keep going. The
sorters help each other but they work
independently.’
POWERFUL PARTNERSHIP
The new facility in Turin is the latest
chapter in a successful collaboration
between Iren and Stadler. ‘We are
proud to be Iren’s supplier,’ says
Paolo Cravedi, senior project manag-
er at Stadler. ‘We started with a small
project in 2020, then went on to work
together on Iren’s e-scrap plant in
Volpiano.’
After that, the tech provider worked
on its plastic recycling plant in
Pianezza and the ReCap facility in
Parma, which processes both plastics
and cardboard. ‘Our team also
designed and built the Valterza plant
in Asti, which sorts mixed plastic
waste made up of mainly bottles and
films.’A total of EUR 48 million has been invested in Iren Ambiente’s new recycling facility in Turin.
Willi Stadler with his daughter, Julia, and Massimiliano Gunari.
The recycling plant sorts 17 types of materials, including polymers, aluminium and ferrous scrap.
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